First History: Pottstown was an important Colonial grain milling center

Pottstown is known in the history books for its production of iron and steel. However, it was known during the Colonial and Federal years for a different type of commerce.

Largely unknown today, during the 18th and 19th centuries, the grain milling industry played a major role in the economy of Pottstown and the Tri-County area. Two large merchant grain mills on Manatawny Creek, one located in downtown Pottstown near its confluence with the Schuylkill River, the other immediately outside of town on the Philadelphia-Reading Turnpike (now West High Street), became the centers of flour production for the region establishing Pottstown’s first important industry.

Although initially small, as Pottstown grew during its early years, these mills expanded their operations, purchasing larger and larger amounts of wheat and grain locally thus becoming increasingly important economically to the surrounding area. Although they also ground corn and wheat for local farmers like the smaller gristmills in the area did, most of the un-milled grain they used was purchased outright.

Flour from the Pottstown mills was transported for resale to the nearby urban areas including Philadelphia and Reading. While the milling industry was eventually surpassed in economic importance by the 1850s by Pottstown’s iron and steel industry, the flour trade remained a major economic force in the town and the region for 200 years.

Advertisement

In 1752, iron master John Potts obtained almost 1,000 acres of land that now comprises the western half of modern day Pottstown and the area west of Manatawny Creek. Almost immediately, he began building Pottsgrove Manor, which would become his home. At the same time he constructed a dam on Manatawny Creek where it presently crosses King Street. He dug a millrace from the dam easterly to where the Hanover Street Bridge is now, entering back into Manatawny Creek slightly above where the creek enters into the Schuylkill River.

On this race near to but east of his house, he added a large grist mill which faced the Reading Road or Turnpike. The miller’s house is still standing across from Pottsgrove Manor. This mill would become known as Potts’s Upper Mill. Grain was brought by wagon on the turnpike which passed its front door.

At the same time, near the river, where the race entered it, Potts initially built a refinery forge, which he called Pottsgrove Forge. This forge refined the pig iron made at Potts’s Warwick Furnace in Chester County into wrought iron, which was sold to local blacksmiths. The water power provided by the dam and race turned the water wheels to grind the grain at the upper mill and blow the bellows to heat the pig iron at the forge and to work the trip hammer to remove impurities.

In 1759, Potts also became majority owner of a small forge on Valley Creek. This forge was later called Valley Forge and also had a grist mill attached which he expanded shortly after obtaining it. Two years later, in 1761, Potts began laying out the town of Potts Grove (later renamed Pottstown). He closed the forge in town, rebuilt it out of stone and converted it to a second gristmill, which became known as Potts’s Lower Mill. Boats would come up and down the Schuylkill, towed up the race to the mill, and loaded or unloaded.

With the purchase of Valley Mills, John Potts owned three large grist mills and, until his death in 1768, he was the major producer of flour in the area of Chester, Montgomery and Berks counties. Pottstown flour was routinely sold in Philadelphia. This production of flour, along with the iron for which he is more widely known, made him one of the richest men in the state.

From the outset, the Schuylkill River played a role in both the production and distribution of the flour. Corn, wheat, and other grains were initially floated on rafts or boats down the Schuylkill River by farmers or brought to town in wagons and sold. But even up until 1800, the Schuylkill River was only navigable to Reading and Philadelphia during spring freshets, so wagons and hence roads played an important role in its production and distribution. Later the Schuylkill canal and the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad were used reducing the need for wagon transport.

In 1797 David Potts tried to sell the lower mill and provided a good description: “There are few mills better situated either for wheat or easy conveyance of flour to market down the Schuylkill, generally from February till May in the spring, and frequently in the summer and fall. The mill is large and built of stone, has two water wheels and three pair of stones, one pair of burrs, one of Cologne, and one pair of country stones; is capable of making 4,000 barrels of flour yearly, besides country work, which is considerable.”

The Pottstown mills were not like small country gristmills whose owners ground local grain, charging a percentage of what was ground. They were much larger “merchant” mills which purchased grain directly from farmers. These larger mills produced a much finer grade of flour than the country mills and some amount of the Pottstown flour sent to Philadelphia would have been used for the Atlantic trade. While grain was purchased, much of the wheat and corn used at the mills was grown on the Potts plantation attached to the Upper Mill. Production at these mills by 1800 was from 250 to 500 barrels of flour a week.

The two Pottstown mills would produce flour for a large span of years. Of interest, during the Revolution, while the Potts family and other local iron masters were producing cannon and armaments for Washington’s Army, it was Pottstown flour which was sent down the Schuylkill by the mills during the Valley Forge encampment to keep it from starving.

After the Revolution, before advent of the Schuylkill Navigation (Canal), the flour from Potts’s mills was taken to the river for distribution by boats. A regular route from Reading to Philadelphia had been established by this time. On the way down river, the boats stopped at Pottstown, unloading corn and grain and loading flour for the Philadelphia markets. The boats were then poled back up, again stopping at Pottstown and loading flour for Reading. The crews consisted of four or five men and the trip took two days down and four or five back.

During the early 1800s, both flour mills were rebuilt, had their production machinery updated, and were considerably enlarged. The Schuylkill Canal, which opened in 1824, greatly expanded the mill’s ability to obtain grain from the surrounding countryside and to transport their flour at a cheaper rate. It also extended the period during which water transportation was available to Philadelphia to almost year round. The Canal followed the western bank of the river and stopped at Pottsgrove Landing across from Pottstown. Passengers and freight and flour would be ferried across the river to Pottstown’s landing, immediately up river from the Lower Mill, and the end of Hanover Street.

It was the coming of the railroad to Pottstown in 1836 that assured grain could be brought in and flour taken out cheaply. It was about this time the milling industry reached its peak as Pottstown’s most important industry. The railroads ushered in an era of iron production that was unprecedented. Numerous plants were built and Pottstown’s economy began moving quickly towards iron and steel.

It should be noted, while the two Pottstown mills were successful, there was one thing structurally wrong with their setup. They were both located on the same race which was designed so that the water used by the Upper Mill to turn its water wheel, emptied back into the race below where the lower race took its water from the race. Consequently, the Upper Mill could prevent the Lower Mill from having enough water to turn its water wheel which in turn, turned the mill stone.

As long as John Potts, or his family, owned both mills there was no conflict. When Potts died in 1768, he anticipated a future problem. He added an item to his will saying in effect that the Upper Mill had to share water with the Lower Mill and that both should have equal access to the race’s water. The Upper Mill and Lower Mill did have separate histories. After his death, they eventually were owned by different owners and, as Potts predicted, there were water rights issues. In 1844, the Lower Mill owner sued the Upper Mill owner in Montgomery County court for withholding water and the Upper Mill lost the suit which went all the way to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

The industry eventually closed down. In 1877, the Upper Mill was burned by a spark from the Colebrookdale Railroad which ran by it and was not rebuilt. Nothing remains of the mill although the stone miller’s house is still standing. An engraving of the mill appeared in the 1874 Potts Memorial.

The Lower Mill had a longer existence. The mill was eventually enlarged again and converted into a Rolling Flour Mill and produced flour up until the Hurricane Agnes flood of 1972, after which it closed.

The building is still in existence, and is now known as the Rolling Mills Apartments. The Pottstown Historical Society has an early picture. It is the only surviving reminder of Pottstown’s once important industry.